Nintendo Expects Big from DS

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Profits fall this year, but next year shoud be better.

By Anoop Gantayat

Nintendo expects to sell 3.5 million units of its Nintendo DS portable hardware between release and March 31, 2005, the company revealed today. Over the same period, the company expects to sell fifteen million pieces of software for the system.

These bold expectations come as part of Nintendo's annual financial report, revealed today to investors in Japan. The financial statement overall points a darker picture for the company than last year's performance.

Sales for fiscal 2003 (April 1, 2003 to March 31, 2004) were at 514,805,000,000 yen, up from 2002's 504,135,000,000 yen. Profit was down from last year's totals, though, coming in at 33,194,000,000 yen compared to 2002's 67,267,000,000 yen.

Nintendo blames the drop in profits on the tough hardware battle it's been fighting over the past year and also points to a drop in software sales in the Japanese market.

A few titles and properties did manage huge numbers for the company, though. Mario Advance 4 and Donkey Kong Country managed worldwide sales of over a million units. Pokemon Ruby & Saphire are on track to cross the six million sales mark. Pokemon Leaf Green & Fire Red as well as the Famicom Mini series also managed a million in Japanese sales (when putting all the Mini titles together of course) in a short amount of time.

Getting specific, the company sold 17,590,000 Game Boy Advance units throughout the year, with 3.15 million coming from Japan, 9.45 million from North America and 5.0 million coming from the remainder of the world (which apparently includes Europe). Of this, SP accounted for 15,050,000 units, split across 2.86 million in Japan, 7,95 million in North America and 4.24 million elsewhere.

Worldwide totals for the Game Boy Advance stand at 51,400,000 units, split between 13,210,000 units in Japan, 24,810,000 units in North America and 13,380,000 units elsewhere. SP accounts for 17,160,000 units of this, with 3,680,000 units in Japan, 8,780,000 units in North America and 4,700,000 units elsewhere.

The Game Boy Advance saw software sales at 74,890,000 units throughout the world, with Japan contributing 17,120,000 units across 156 titles, North America contributing 42,430,000 units across 145 titles and other areas contributing 15,350,000 units across 142 games. Software totals throughout the life of the system stand at 183,790,000 pieces of software. This is split between Japan at 47,000,000 units across 529 titles, North America at 96,470,000 units across 515 titles and other areas of the world at 40,330,000 units across 490 games.

GameCube hardware managed 5,020,000 unit sales throughout the year, down from last year's total of 5,760,000 million units. Of this, Japan contributed 990,000 units, North America 2,720,000 units and other areas of the world 1,320,000 units. Worldwide totals for the system stand at 14,570,000 units, with 3,460,000 in Japan, 7,850,000 units in North America and 3,270,000 units elsewhere.

GameCube software was up for the year. Compared to last year's 46,140,000 pieces of software, the system sold 47,370,000 pieces of software this year split at 8,500,000 units across eighty-nine titles in Japan, 28,350,000 units across 125 titles in North America and 10,520,000 units across 127 titles elsewhere in the world. Totals for software since the system launch stand at 107,870,000 units. This splits worldwide as 18,900,000 units across 188 titles in Japan, 64,580,000 units across 326 titles in North America and 24,390,000 units across 277 titles elsewhere in the world.

For this year, Nintendo is looking forward to the launch of the Nintendo DS, but it does admit to an expected drop in sales across other hardware. Game Boy Advance SP is expected to sell fourteen million units worldwide with GameCube coming in at 4.5 million units. For software, the company expects seventy million Game Boy Advance games and forty-five million pieces of GameCube software for the year.

Sales for 2004 are expected to be 530,000,000,000 yen with profit up considerably to 70,000,000,000 yen.